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I have a player that would like to take the Lore Warden for a character in our Pathfinder home game.
I reviewed the archetype and found it to be a little too powerful. Most of the trade-offs feel balanced with the exception of Maneuver Mastery. I don't see Armor Mastery 1 being equal to gaining +2 CMB/CMD every 4 levels.
At 3rd level, a lore warden gains a +2 bonus on all CMB checks and to his CMD. This bonus increases to +4 at 7th level, +6 at 11th level, and +8 at 15th level.
I am looking for ideas to rebalancing the archetype while still making it worth while. I don't want to over-weaken it.
My initial thoughts were:
Cut the Maneuver Mastery bonuses in half, but leave the rest as-is. This makes the benefit similar to the Brawler's Close Control.
...OR...
Make the Maneuver Mastery benefit a one-time +2 CMB/CMD bonus.
I am wondering if someone has any other suggestions.
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Personally, I feel like the archetype as a whole works, but I think your second fix (making it a one-time bonus) is a better fit.
Replacing a static effect (well, one tier of a scaling effect, but whatever) with a scaling effect is just sort of "off."
Another suggestion would be to rework the ability as "A lore warden is treated as size Large (if he is not already larger) when performing combat maneuvers or having combat maneuvers performed against him." That provides a small numeric bonus, but also opens up combat maneuvers like Trip against larger opponents and lets Small lore wardens keep up with combat maneuvers.
Cheers!
Landon
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Design Manager
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So here's the thing with the Lore Warden-
He's not balanced to the core Fighter. He is however pretty well balanced to pretty much all of the other classes in the game. I could go on at great length about the fact that if you were to break every class in the game down into a 100 point buy for class features, the Fighter ends up with only 60-75 points where everyone else clears 100 easy, but I won't unless you really want me to.
So my first question would be, what is everyone else playing, and how experienced is your group? If you've got a solid mix of classes in a group with a moderate amount of experience, no one is going to notice that the Lore Warden is doing a little bit more than a normal FIghter, and they might actually appreciate his contributions.
My second question would be, what are you worried this is going to break? Are a lot fo the anticipated enemies humanoid? Are there other players who will be filling a similar niche? If not, there's probably nothing to be concerned about.
If you really feel that you need to cut it back, I'd suggest going with your initial thought and just cutting the bonuses gained by level in half each time they'd normally be gained. This will still work out to him being better with maneuvers than most other Fighters, though he'll still have to actually invest the feats in completing maneuver trees if he wants to keep them viable during higher levels of play.
Replacing it with an ability that says the Lore Warden may treat himself as a size category larger for determining the bonuses and effects of any maneuver he performs would also be a solid solution, though it creates a kind of dead level scenario since it doesn't scale like the ability it's replacing (and shouldn't; you don't want Lore Wardens prancing about pretending to be colossal).
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Lore Warden is perfectly balanced. If you think the archetype is stronger than baseline fighter, that's because it it.
However you must remember that baseline fighter is worse than Ranger, Paladin, Barbarian, and Cavalier/samurai.
Let him be a viable fighter and use the Lore Warden unchanged.
Those static bonuses to CMB/CMD are worth less point for point as character level increases. The average of non-humanoid enemy CMB/CMD advances at a faster rate as their CR increases, so lore warden is just keeping up better than some builds/archetypes. It balances fine compared with other martials.
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Armor Training is one of the best abilities fighters have. Seriously, when I play a paladin I really feel that encumbrance penalty to movement. It's extremely annoying when everything can run away from you.
The lorewarden sacrifices armor, without gaining a different defensive solution to prevent people from turning it into a red smear on the pavement. Instead, lorewardens need Maneuver Training to go on the offensive just to survive.
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Thanks for the replies guys.
I apologize to those that are looking to discuss the viability of the Lore Warden as it is written. I am not interested in that. I have already come to the conclusion that the Lore Warden is more powerful that I want in MY game.
In our game, the Core Rulebook and most of the APG is considered legal for play. Some material in Ultimate Magic and Ultimate Combat is allowed, but must be approved by the GM (some stuff I am ok with, some stuff I am not). Materials outside of those books is most likely not allowed, although I will consider it (some of the information in the Animal Archive is excellent, for example).
If you think the Lore Warden is balanced, that's great for your game...but then this conversation is not for you. I am looking for help from those who might see my perspective and could have an alternate solution.
When a player comes to me asking to use something outside the acepted materials, I would rather come with a compromise instead of a flat-out 'no'.
Personally, I feel like the archetype as a whole works, but I think your second fix (making it a one-time bonus) is a better fit.
Replacing a static effect (well, one tier of a scaling effect, but whatever) with a scaling effect is just sort of "off."
I thought the static vs scaling was odd at first as well, but since I noted that other archetypes used differing mechanics, I didn't mind so much. Thanks for the suggestions.
So my first question would be, what is everyone else playing, and how experienced is your group?
- Human Ranger2(beastmaster) / veteran Pathfinder player
- Half-Orc Barbarian2 / veteran Pathfinder player- Human Paladin2 / new Pathfinder player
- Gnome Sorcerer (earth) / veteran Pathfinder player
- Human Wizard (conjurer) / veteran D&D 3.5 player, new Pathfinder player
The player with the Human Ranger is asking about switching out his character for the Lore Warden.
We are using 20pt characters. 90% of the rest of the world is peasants using a 5pt buy. The other 10% varies from 5pt buy to 25pt buy. So, player characters are certainly the cream of the crop.
The campaign is based in Golarion, but is a lower magic campaign. this does not mean that the spell casting classes are nerfed at all, but it does mean that spell casters and magic items are less common than a standard Pathfinder game.
My second question would be, what are you worried this is going to break?
I am looking at overall class balance. I have begun to notice power creep as Paizo releases new content. I want to keep the game balanced not only when it comes to combat with the creatures the party encounters, but between the party members themselves. It is for this reason that I have limited the majority of the content that we are using to the Core Rulebook and APG (as I commented on above). While it may seem like a small thing to worry about this archetype, I think that it's worth the time to consider not only the big things, but the small things as well.
If you really feel that you need to cut it back, I'd suggest going with your initial thought and just cutting the bonuses gained by level in half each time they'd normally be gained.
That is still my favored solution since it is mostly comparable to Brawler's Close Control and is also a simple solution.
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I have a player that would like to take the Lore Warden for a character in our Pathfinder home game.
I reviewed the archetype and found it to be a little too powerful.
That is literally the funniest thing I have read today.
I apologize to those that are looking to discuss the viability of the Lore Warden as it is written. I am not interested in that. I have already come to the conclusion that the Lore Warden is more powerful that I want in MY game.
I suggest he play a druid, then.
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Woah, so he wants to downgrade from a ranger to a fighter? Odd. Well just letting you know that the poor sap is going to find himself struggling to keep up with that Barb and Paladin if he decides to play a fighter.
Suggest instead to him the Guide Ranger from APG and picking up various "improved combat maneuver" feats and Favored enemy human. It will allow him to do combat maneuvers almost as well and he'll find that his character isn't so weak that he wants to commit sepuku and reroll.
Alternatively he can play a Battle Oracle and use the revelation to be good at combat maneuvers.
I would only suggest someone to play a fighter if I hated them, especially in a group that eclipses him so hard. I mean a Paladin AND a Barbarian? Totally eclipsed. At least if he's a Lore Warden he can claim to be good at SOMETHING.
Then again it looks like your group has no divine caster
Maybe an Inquisitor Archer since they get the good anti-suck spells and are great in combat.
Battle Oracle
Cleric of anything
A BARD TO BUFF THE PALADIN AND BARB
A witch to be awesome at life.
Against medium-sized creatures, the CMB/CMD bonuses look high, but when you compare the fighter's CMB total vs. the CMD of most large, huge, etc. creatures, you'll find that they really aren't. He'll be good at tripping/disarming humanoids, but he's going to have trouble doing the same to a titan unless he really optimizes around it. Also, take a look at the titan's CMB bonus. Even with maneuver mastery, the lorewarden's going to have trouble resisting the titan's bull rush, sunder, or awesome blow.
My advice: no change is necessary. A fine compromise, I think, if you're still convinced is to either: halve the bonuses OR restrict them to a single maneuver of the fighter's choice.